I went back and watched Twilight: New Moon (2009)

The Sophomore Slump

New Moon, the second installment in the Twilight saga, attempts something genuinely daring for a blockbuster franchise: it removes its male lead for the majority of the film's runtime. This bold narrative choice serves the story's emotional arc but simultaneously exposes the franchise's structural weaknesses. In an era where young adult adaptations were rushing to capitalize on the success of the first film, New Moon takes the unexpected route of dwelling in darkness, depression, and absence—a risky gambit that doesn't entirely pay off.

A Study in Absence

The film opens promisingly with Bella's nightmare about aging while Edward remains eternally young, immediately establishing the central anxiety that will drive the plot. The birthday party sequence that follows—where a paper cut triggers Jasper's attack and Edward's subsequent decision to leave—is handled with appropriate weight. But what comes after is where the film either succeeds or fails, depending on your tolerance for extended emotional suffering.

The film's greatest strength is also its most significant liability. After Edward Cullen abandons Bella Swan "for her own good," we're subjected to an extended meditation on teenage heartbreak that feels authentic in its bleakness but punishing in its execution. Director Chris Weitz commits fully to depicting Bella's depression through a memorable sequence of seasonal transitions, watching her stare catatonically out her bedroom window as months pass. It's visually striking and emotionally honest, representing perhaps the most realistic depiction of teenage depression in a mainstream blockbuster. The problem is that authenticity doesn't always translate to engaging cinema.

Charlie Swan, Bella's father, emerges as an unexpected emotional anchor during these sequences. Billy Burke brings a grounded, genuinely concerned parental presence that provides brief respites from Bella's spiral. His helplessness in the face of his daughter's grief rings true, even if the film doesn't give him quite enough to do.

The decision to literalize Bella's inability to let go—through shimmering hallucinations of Edward that appear whenever she courts danger—borders on unintentional comedy. What should feel romantic instead feels like a concerning portrait of someone who needs professional help rather than supernatural intervention. Bella begins seeking out increasingly dangerous situations just to conjure these visions, a behavior the film never adequately interrogates as deeply unhealthy. The motorcycle acquisition, the cliff diving, the wandering alone in dangerous areas—all are presented as romantic desperation rather than self-destructive behavior.

The Wolf in the Room

Taylor Lautner's Jacob Black emerges as the film's saving grace, and the actor rises admirably to the challenge of carrying much of the film's emotional weight. Where Pattinson's Edward broods with marble-cold remove, Lautner brings genuine warmth, humor, and charisma. His chemistry with Stewart feels natural and lived-in, their scenes together crackling with an ease that the Edward-Bella relationship often lacks. When Jacob and Bella repair motorcycles together or simply talk on the beach, the film finds a rhythm and lightness it desperately needs.

The reveal of Jacob's werewolf nature is handled reasonably well, though the subsequent pack dynamics feel underdeveloped. The Quileute legends, as told by tribal elder Billy Black and later explored through Jacob's transformation, add much-needed texture to the world-building. The concept of the werewolves as protectors, their ancestral duty to guard against vampires, provides interesting mythological depth. However, the film never fully explores the implications of Jacob's loss of control over his own transformation, the way his entire life has been upended, or the trauma of his violent new reality.

The film's central emotional conflict—Bella using Jacob as an emotional substitute while pining for Edward—doesn't paint our protagonist in a flattering light, even if it's psychologically realistic. Jacob deserves better than to be someone's second choice, someone's project, someone's distraction. The film seems intermittently aware of this unfairness but never allows Bella to truly reckon with her behavior. When Jacob confesses his feelings and Bella responds with "I know," echoing Han Solo in a moment that lacks any of that scene's romantic weight, it crystallizes the relationship's fundamental imbalance.

The Aesthetic of Melancholy

Cinematographer Javier Aguirresarobe brings a muted, desaturated palette to Bella's depression that gradually warms as Jacob enters her life—a visual metaphor so obvious it almost works. The contrast between the cold blues of Bella's isolation and the warmer tones of her scenes with Jacob effectively communicates her emotional state without relying entirely on Stewart's performance, though she handles the material with more nuance than she's often given credit for.

The action sequences involving the werewolves, unfortunately, haven't aged well. The CGI wolves already felt somewhat dated upon release and now appear distinctly artificial. The physics of their movements, the texture of their fur, the way they interact with the environment—all feel slightly off, pulling viewers out of what should be thrilling confrontations. The fight with Laurent in the meadow, potentially a powerful moment, is undercut by the visual effects' limitations.

Italian Interlude

The third act's relocation to Volterra, Italy, provides a burst of visual energy and Gothic grandeur the film desperately needs. After so much time spent in the perpetually overcast Pacific Northwest, the sun-drenched Italian countryside and the medieval architecture of Volterra feel like a different film entirely. The sequence where Bella races through the festival of San Marco, pushing through crowds in a desperate attempt to stop Edward from revealing himself, generates genuine tension.

The Volturi, vampire royalty led by Michael Sheen's delightfully theatrical Aro, finally give the franchise some genuine menace and gravitas. Sheen understands exactly what kind of movie he's in and calibrates his performance accordingly—just heightened enough to feel threatening without tipping into camp. His tactile obsession with Edward and Alice, touching them to read their thoughts, brings an unsettling intimacy to his villainy. Dakota Fanning's Jane, whose gift allows her to inflict psychic pain, is underutilized but makes an impression in her limited screen time. The Volturi's lair, with its minimalist stone aesthetic and sudden brutality, finally gives the vampire world the weight and history it needs.

The confrontation with the Volturi raises interesting questions about vampire law and governance that the film frustratingly leaves unexplored. The notion that the Volturi maintain order by eliminating those who expose their existence makes sense, but the film doesn't dig into the politics or the history of this system. Who decided these rules? What happens when the Volturi themselves are challenged? These questions hang in the air, unanswered.

The Love Triangle's Architecture

At its core, New Moon is about Bella caught between two worlds, two futures, two versions of herself. Edward represents eternal life, sophistication, danger, and the allure of the unknown. Jacob represents mortality, warmth, safety, and the comfort of the familiar. It's a compelling dichotomy on paper, but the film's execution makes Bella's choice feel less like a genuine dilemma and more like a foregone conclusion we're forced to watch play out.

The film never seriously entertains the possibility that Bella might choose Jacob, despite giving us every reason to hope she would. Jacob is kind, present, and actually respects Bella's agency—at least until his transformation complicates things. Edward, by contrast, made a unilateral decision to leave "for her own good" without consulting her, a paternalistic gesture the film presents as tragically romantic rather than controlling. When they reunite in Volterra, we're supposed to swoon, but it's hard not to notice that Edward has learned nothing from his mistake.

The final scene, where Bella demands Edward turn her into a vampire and he proposes marriage as a condition, crystallizes the franchise's troubling gender politics. Bella wants autonomy over her own body and future; Edward wants to impose his values and timeline on her decisions. The film frames this as romantic negotiation rather than what it actually is: one partner attempting to control the other.

Technical Considerations

Chris Weitz's direction is notably more polished than Catherine Hardwicke's work on the first film. Where Twilight felt scrappy and independent, New Moon has the sheen of a proper studio production. The cinematography is less murky, the editing more assured, the production design more expansive. Yet these improvements in craft only highlight the source material's limitations. The dialogue, adapted from Stephenie Meyer's novel by Melissa Rosenberg, remains leaden and overly literal. Characters announce their feelings rather than embodying them, explaining their motivations in ways that feel more like narration than natural speech.

Alexandre Desplat's score brings some emotional sophistication, though it's often asked to do too much heavy lifting, swelling to indicate feelings the screenplay hasn't adequately developed. The use of indie rock and alternative music—including tracks from Death Cab for Cutie, Thom Yorke, and Lykke Li—gives the film some cultural credibility and helps establish the Pacific Northwest setting's alternative sensibility.

What It Says, What It Doesn't

Beyond its plot mechanics, New Moon functions as a meditation on first love, loss, and the difficulty of moving forward. For its target audience of teenage girls, many experiencing their first serious heartbreaks, the film's emotional intensity likely resonates deeply. Bella's inability to function without Edward, while troubling from a feminist perspective, probably felt painfully familiar to many viewers navigating similar feelings.

However, the film's ultimate message—that Bella cannot exist as a complete person without Edward—remains problematic. She has no ambitions beyond becoming a vampire to be with him, no interests outside of her relationships, no sense of self that isn't defined by which supernatural boy she's with. Even her friendship with Jacob is ultimately subsumed into the romantic triangle. Where are her other friends? What does she want to do with her life? Who is Bella Swan when she's alone? The film not only fails to answer these questions; it seems uninterested in asking them.

Final Verdict

New Moon is a film that will satisfy devoted fans of the books while likely alienating casual viewers. Its commitment to depicting depression and heartbreak is admirable in its honesty but makes for a dreary viewing experience. The love triangle dynamics, while emotionally complex, feel fundamentally dishonest in their foregone conclusion. The film knows Bella will choose Edward but forces us to watch Jacob's heart break anyway, treating his pain as a necessary sacrifice to the central romance.

For a franchise film, it takes risks. But risks don't always pay off, and New Moon ultimately feels like a necessary bridge between the first and third films rather than a satisfying experience in its own right. It's a movie about waiting—waiting for Edward to return, waiting for the plot to advance, waiting for Bella to make a choice we know she's already made. Unfortunately, that wait feels considerably longer than the film's 130-minute runtime.

The film is at its best when it allows Taylor Lautner to shine, when it explores the Quileute mythology, and when it finally delivers us to Italy for some Gothic vampire drama. It's at its worst when it wallows in Bella's depression without interrogating the unhealthy patterns it depicts, when its CGI wolves remind us we're watching a movie, and when it treats Edward's return as an unambiguous happy ending rather than the beginning of another cycle of control and dependence.

Worth watching if: You're committed to the franchise, deeply invested in Team Jacob, or interested in how mainstream cinema depicts teenage depression.

Skip if: You found the first film's pacing slow, have limited patience for extended sequences of teenage angst, or prefer romances where the female protagonist has agency and identity beyond her romantic relationships.

In the end, New Moon is exactly what it needed to be for its fans and exactly what its detractors expected. It commits to its choices, for better and worse, and there's something almost admirable about its refusal to compromise its bleak vision—even when that vision makes for occasionally punishing cinema.